This statement does not cover the University of Sunderland’s main website www.sunderland.ac.uk. Please refer to the accessibility statement for www.sunderland.ac.uk if your query concerns that site.
The University’s web estate consists of many related sub-sites with the sunderland.ac.uk domain. Accessibility statements for such sub-sites will be found locally on each site.
This accessibility statement applies to websites that are managed in the Terminalfour platform and are primarily only for current staff and student audiences such as the Student Journey website. However, it also includes public-facing websites such as Human Resources. The majority of these sites have pages that do not meet a significant number of the WCAG 2.1 AA success criteria.
This website is run by the University of Sunderland. We want as many people as possible to be able to use this website. For example, that means you should be able to:
- change colours, contrast levels and fonts
- zoom in up to 300% without the text spilling off the screen
- navigate most of the website using just a keyboard
- navigate most of the website using speech recognition software
- listen to most of the website using a screen reader (including the most recent versions of JAWS, NVDA and VoiceOver)
You can find useful advice on making your device more easy to use by visiting AbilityNet, which provides step-by-step guides to making individual adjustments to your laptop, tablet or smart phone.
How accessible this website is
We know some parts of this website are not fully accessible:
- some parts may not be fully compatible with screen readers
- the text will not reflow in a single column when you change the size of the browser window
- you cannot modify the line height or spacing of text
- most older PDF documents are not fully accessible to screen reader software
- not all media will have a transcript or be subtitled
- some tables do not have row headers
- some images do not have good alternative text or are missing.
Feedback and contact information
If you need information on this website in a different format like accessible PDF, large print, easy read, audio recording or braille:
Web: IT Portal
Email: webteam@sunderland.ac.uk
Call: +44 191 515 2424
We’ll consider your request and get back to you in 5 days.
Reporting accessibility problems with this website
We’re always looking to improve the accessibility of this website. If you find any problems not listed on this page or think we’re not meeting accessibility requirements, contact: webteam@sunderland.ac.uk.
Enforcement procedure
The Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) is responsible for enforcing the Public Sector Bodies (Websites and Mobile Applications) (No. 2) Accessibility Regulations 2018 (the ‘accessibility regulations’). If you’re not happy with how we respond to your complaint, contact the Equality Advisory and Support Service (EASS).
Technical information about this website’s accessibility
The University of Sunderland is committed to making its website accessible, in accordance with the Public Sector Bodies (Websites and Mobile Applications) (No. 2) Accessibility Regulations 2018.
Compliance status
This website is partially compliant with the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines version 2.1 AA standard, due to the the non-compliances and exemptions listed below.
Non-accessible content
The content listed below is non-accessible for the following reasons.
Non-compliance with the accessibility regulations
Navigation and accessing information
Some headings on webpages are not organised to appear in order. We will correct heading order as we review each page.
It is not possible to use a keyboard to access all the content. We will ensure content can be navigated by keyboard as we review each page.
Some information is conveyed as an image of text rather than as text itself so that it's not compatible with screen readers and other assistive technology. We will ensure content conveyed as an image is replaced by HTML when we review each page.
Most tooltips disappear as soon as the cursor moves. Also, tooltips are not always present for all icons and images. We will reconsider tooltip usage when we review each page.
Some links are not labelled clearly, for example, they make not sense when taken out of context. We will correct link text over time as we review each page.
Contrast
There may not be sufficient colour contrast between font and background colours especially where the text size is very small. We will change colours to ensure sufficient contrast when we review each page.
Visual information to identify user interface components, such as keyboard focus, do not always have a sufficient contrast ratio. We will correct contrast as we review each page.
Media
Not all pre-recorded audio-only or video-only media will have alternative media that presents equivalent information e.g. audio track with description of the action in a video with no sound. We are working through all media to add these and expect this to be complete by October 2020.
Not all video will have subtitles or subtitles that identify all speakers as well as noting other significant sounds e.g. laughter. We are working through all media to add these and expect this to be complete by October 2020.
Information is conveyed as an image of text rather than as text itself so that it's not compatible with screen readers and other assistive technology
PDFs and other documents
Not all our PDFs and Word documents meet accessibility standards. From July 2020 onwards we are running a series of workshops and campaigns to highlight this issue and train users in how to audit and then improve the accessibility of these documents.
Forms
It might not be possible for all form fields to be programmatically determined. This means that when using auto-fill functionality for forms not all fields will identify the meaning for input data accurately.
Google reCAPTCHA causes an accessibility error due to a missing label. We have researched and explored ways to fix this but have unfortunately not found a solution. We have tested with a screen reader and different browsers and it is still possible to interact with and solve the reCAPTCHA. Also using the audio test to solve additional verification works with a screen reader. It worked especially well using the Chrome browser.
On some pages the ID used for an element is not unique.
Some labels may not indicate the purpose of the fields they relate to
Other
While we have a 'Skip to content' link on every page when new users access the website they will receive our cookie consent banner at the bottom of the page. This can't be skipped over as it's important to get consent for cookies to comply with the General Data Protection Regulations.
Some iframes are missing the ‘Title’ tag (YouTube videos, Twitter feeds).
We aim to improve our websites accessibility on a regular and continuous basis. See the section below ('What we're doing to improve accessibility') on how we are improving our site accessibility.
Disproportionate burden
We are not currently claiming that any accessibility problems would be a disproportionate burden to fix.
Content that’s not within the scope of the accessibility regulations
PDFs and other documents
Many of our older PDFs and Word documents do not meet accessibility standards - for example, they may not be structured so they’re accessible to a screen reader.
Some of our PDFs and Word documents are essential to providing our services. For example, we have PDFs with information on how users can access our services, and forms published as Word documents. We will also try to ensure any new PDFs or Word documents we publish will meet accessibility standards and where we find any that are not accessible we will rectify this as soon as possible.
The accessibility regulations do not require us to fix PDFs or other documents published before 23 September 2018 if they’re not essential to providing our services. Regulations for PDFs or other documents published before 23 September 2018.
Third-party content
Our website contains third-party content. We do not have control over and are not responsible for the accessibility of this content, we use reasonable endeavours to work with the third party to improve its accessibility. The problems that may occur include:
- Colour contrast issues.
- Keyboard navigation not functional.
- Videos closed captions missing.
- Missing ALT tags on images
- Links to non-University of Sunderland websites
For any of the third party products that you may issues with accessing, you may be also be able to find accessibility statements in searchBOX. This is a free, comprehensive directory created by textbox to support accessible content. The University is not affiliated with searchBOX and is not responsible for its content.
If you find any of our Library resources hard to access, then please contact the webteam at webteam@sunderland.ac.uk directly for help.
What we’re doing to improve accessibility
Our accessibility roadmap shows how and when we plan to improve accessibility on this website.
- A regular weekly central website audit using an automated service, followed by manual prioritisation of issues with key user journeys
- A full University web estate audit to assess issues with site accessibility, security and data protection.
- Support, guidance and training process in place for University staff to increase awareness of accessibility and what our responsibilities are.
- From July 2020 onwards we are running a series of workshops and campaigns to highlight the importance of accessibility and train users in how to audit and then improve the accessibility of published content and services.
Preparation of this accessibility statement
This statement was prepared on 21 September 2020. It was last reviewed on 21 September 2020.
This website was last tested in September 2020. The test was carried out by The University of Sunderland Web Team.
This website is tested weekly using a quality assurance tool to identify accessibility issues.
Our website is tested on a regular basis, with a new scan scheduled every seven days using an automated accessibility tool provided by LittleForest. This tool tests all web pages and provides a report on accessibility issues. Manual checks are also performed on a sample of pages on Staff and Student websites using the Terminalfour platform.
Issues are prioritised according to the severity of the impact it may cause, the number of people that may be impacted and the time involved in resolving the issue.